Three fight for £950m David Lloyd

Three bidders are expected to table offers of between £900m and £950m for Whitbread's David Lloyd Leisure business today.

MidOcean Partners, which already owns LA Fitness, and property tycoons Ian and Richard Livingstone are seen as the front runners to win the race for the 69-strong health club chain.

Syrian-born entrepreneur Simon Halabi, who bought the Esporta gym group earlier this year, is also keen.

But doubts have grown about whether he will be able to secure financial backing for the deal following the recent departure of the firm's chief executive Neil Gillis and finance director Michael Ball.

Halabi also encountered delays completing the Esporta deal and some industry players believe he would have to work hard to convince Whitbread's bankers he can stump up the cash.

The deadline for bids is today. If the hurdles facing Halabi prove too high, the auction will become a two-horse race.

MidOcean is understood to have lined up multi-millionaire Nick Leslau to take on David Lloyd's property should it win the auction. The Livingstone brothers will bid through their property firm London & Regional which already owns the Next Generation health club chain.

It is understood one of the potential bidders has approached Gillis about running David Lloyd after the deal.

Whitbread has turned around the performance of David Lloyd in the past year after installing new management.

It bought the business 12 years ago for £200m from former British Davis Cup tennis captain David Lloyd.

The sale would be the latest in a series of disposals and could mean further cash returns for Whitbread shareholders.

The leisure group has in the past year sold off its TGI Friday's business, its Pizza Hut joint venture and 239 pubs.

It would leave the slimmed down Whitbread to focus on its Costa coffee chain, budget hotel business Premier Travel Inns and Brewers Fayre and Beefeater pubs.

Led by chief executive Alan Parker, the decision to sell off various parts of the business has gone down well with investors. Shares in the group (up 3p to 1916p) are up 84% in the past 12 months.